Changing the Rules
by Silver Phantom 2
Summary: Remember in Ghosts of Onyx when Fred wonders what happened to Gray Team? Well, this is what happened...


OK, this is more of a novella than anything else. It's my first Halo fanfiction that's actually a Christmas present for somebody. This is Part 1, Part 2's coming soon. Enjoy. Oh yes, disclaimer.

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**Changing the Rules**

A Halo Fanfiction

By Silver Phantom 2

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**December 26, 2551**

**UNSC _Goliath_**

**Beyond United Nations Space Command-controlled Orion Arm**

Dr. Amanda Ness was a student to Dr. Catherine Halsey back in 2514, before the Human-Covenant War. Now, that seemed like millennia ago. For the pasty twenty years, Amanda had been led on that there was a series of rebellions happening in the outer colonies with the UNSC on the winning side.

She ignored the news waves up until now, when Dr. Halsey sent a _personal _message telling her the truth of the past 27 years: the human race was going extinct. An alien armada known as "The Covenant" possessed technology at least a century ahead of the UNSC and was going on a xenophobic rampage throughout the galaxy to destroy the last trace of homo sapiens.

The Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) estimated that they had only a few more years before the Covenant found Earth. Then they would have no where to run to.

_Which is why, _Dr. Halsey's message read, _I'm sending five Spartans and a battalion to defend your project._

Amanda couldn't begin to imagine what an ancient alien city, floating in the oxygen ring of the gas giant Zheng He, had to do with a war she'd surprisingly never heard of.

ONI propaganda must have done its job well.

Amanda walked onto the bridge of the _Goliath _and shook hands with an aging man who had a crown of salt and pepper hair and a big gray mustache, "Welcome aboard, Doctor. I am Vice Admiral Sciuto. Our battle group is here to defend your team."

"Thank you, Admiral." Amanda said, "But is the situation really _that _serious? I mean, what would the Covenant want with a bunch of alien ruins?"

Admiral Sciuto paced towards a console, "Your artifacts aren't the only alien ruins we've found." Amanda knew that 'we' meant the United Nations Space Command, the UNSC, "But they're certainly the most extraordinary. Whenever the Covenant encounter ruins like these, they revere them; probably because there's a power source, or a technology, the truth is: I don't know. But the Covenant wants it. And I'm not letting them have it.

"We have twelve ships here armed to the teeth. Oh, meet your new security guards." Admiral Sciuto held out a hand towards a door behind Amanda.

She turned, still stunned from the shock of this all, and saw five figures march through the door way. Each stood eight feet tall and looked more like five machines than human beings.

No, they looked like Greek gods.

They were clad in dark green armor plating and had a gold plate to cover their faces. The lead one looked at her and said, "Spartan-109 reporting for duty, ma'am." His deep and raspy voice had a tinny sound to it.

"Spartans?" Amanda asked, not really to anyone; she made the connection between the Greek city-state famous for its warriors, Dr. Halsey's special project, and the hulking figures standing before her, "You're Dr. Halsey's aren't you?" she asked Spartan-109.

"No, ma'am." He responded, "We're yours."

* * *

Ryan wasn't actually sure which was more comfortable, the _Goliath_, or the floating cities in Zheng He. He'd much rather fight on solid ground, but this time they had little choice. From Gray Team's grumbling, he could tell they felt the same.

"I'm all fine and dandy fighting _in _a city," Derek-062 said, "But _on_ one… how come we never heard of these?" Derek was Gray Team's sniper. He could bring down entire divisions had he the ammo and the time.

"Please, you think FLEETCOM would go blabby about something like this?" Reichel-004 "Rei" was their demolitions artist. She knew everything about bomb making; she would often rig an orange to spray battery acid as a distraction while the rest of them proceeded to make mayhem. Ryan watched her stuff a duffel bag with explosives including a box of oranges and a pack of C-grade batteries.

Ryan watched the other Rachel on the team (to distinguish Rachel-143 and Reichel-004, Rachel-143 was referred to as "RJ") pack her grenade pouches full of frags, and take an extra pouch filled with M90 shotgun shells.

RJ grabbed a shotgun for herself and wrapped the strap around her shoulder. Her acknowledgment light flashed green for a full five seconds telling Ryan she was ready. Rei stood and hefted her duffel bag over her back and flashed her own light. Derek finished putting together his sniper rifle piece-by-piece, picked himself up a few more magazines and an oracle scope before he flashed his light.

The only one Ryan was really worried about was Nicholas-120. Nick's favorite weapon was the combat knife, he and Fred-104 were good friends back on Reach, but orders and necessity took Nick into Gray Team, and it took Gray Team from the real battles like Draco III, Paris IV, Mughal, and New Constantinople. But Nick was a Spartan. He'd do alright.

Ryan and Derek watched Nick as he secured his combat knife and a small metal handle that RJ had to question, "What's that?" she asked.

Nick looked up at them from behind his gold faceplate and said, "Surprise for the Covies."

Rei grunted approval, "Good enough for me. C'mon Nicky- oh! Forgot my rifle." Rei reached back and shoulder an MA5B assault weapon and five clips of ammunition. Nick holstered a side arm and grabbed his own rifle before flashing his green light.

"All right, Team." Ryan said. He walked out of the armory and met the Admiral in the hangar. He was looking out into the large room as the Pelican dropships repositioned themselves to make ready for "ground"-side defensive.

"Admiral." Ryan saluted.

Admiral Sciuto turned and returned their salute. Standing next to him was the civilian, Dr. Ness and a marine with a Lieutenant Commander insignia on his breast pocket, "Spartan." The Admiral said, "This is Lieutenant Commander Fenner of the 144th Mobile."

Ryan looked over the younger man. He was short, had dark skin but Caucasian features. Ryan guessed that the man had seen as much fighting with the Covenant as any half a Spartan, "Lieutenant." The Spartans held their salutes strong.

"At east." Admiral Sciuto told them.

"Spartan-109, my men and I will head to the Installation and set up our defenses. I estimate that it should take us to 1400 to set up our forces against the Covenant. We'll call you when you're ready." Lt. Fenner said.

"Lieutenant." Dr. Ness got his attention, "What kind of 'defenses' are you bringing to my project?" she seemed a little more than annoyed.

"Nothing to worry about, ma'am." Lt. Fenner responded, "We're here to protect your project, after all. It's in Marine hands now."

* * *

**January 14, 2552**

**Zheng He**

**Research Facility "Installation NZ-01"**

Amanda almost felt sorry for Gray Team. For nearly a half-month she had come to familiarize herself with as Ryan (the leader of the group), RJ, Rei, Derek, and Nick, were forced to entertain themselves in the absence of a Covenant assault.

The most important aspect of NZ-01 was a room in the center of the ruin big enough to house four Scorpion Main Battle Tanks. In the center of the room was an ancient alien computer. It had a myriad of holographic panels that served as keyboards and controls for the system. It formed a circle that eventually rose to a large column to the ceiling 1000 feet above their heads.

Standing at the door to the room was Gray Team's guard and sniper, Derek. RJ and Nick were sitting on the floor playing an incredibly fast game of cards. Ryan was 90 degrees around the circle playing a game of chess with Amanda's AI: Jennifer.

By accident, they had discovered that the alien system could adapt to any hardware the humans connected to it.

Jennifer, a gift from ONI, stood in front of Amanda while she played the Spartan in chess and continued her near-eternal task of translating enough alien writing to find the treasure they were looking for. Jennifer looked like a 21st Century 16-year-old. Sometimes, her teenage disposition annoyed Amanda, but she was invaluable to the project.

And overall, Amanda liked her. She wouldn't trade her for a historic- or mythological-themed AI any day.

"Hey, Doc." Jennifer said.

"Amanda rose her head from the order she was typing to one of her subordinates searching through the alien database, "Yes, Jennifer?"

"I found something you might want to check out." A string of symbols flashed across Amanda's field of view, "From the decoding software I have, it says: 'Seven swords, seven shields. Seven knights among the heavens.' I'm not to sure but I think you can substitute 'stars' for 'heavens'."

"Any references to what the 'sword' and 'shield' are?" Amanda asked.

"No, but there is a string of broken stellar coordinates following it." Jennifer answered.

"Broken?" So far, these runes had been untouched.

"They're incomplete. I'm missing a reference point they keep referring to. Probably their homeworld."

"What's the probability that reference point is located here?" Amanda was getting annoyed. Each time she thought they made a breakthrough, it just turned out to be another dead end.

"I don't know." Jennifer said, "I'll keep looking."

'I don't know' was Jennifer's personality-enhanced way of saying 50 probability.

"And to top it off," Amanda said to herself, "now we have a time limit."

* * *

Lieutenant Commander Logan Fenner climbed into the passenger seat of the Warthog LRV (Light Reconnaissance Vehicle) sitting next to Corporal Jason Anderson who was smoking a regulation cigarette.

"Smoking kills, Corporal." Logan said, ignoring the enormous breach in protocol.

"No, sir." Jason argued, "Cigs don't kill people, the Covenant kills people."

"Touché." Logan said. After all, the Marine was right. In the past 27 years, the Covenant had surely killed more people than cancer ever did.

"Sir," a female Marine with a slight Australian accent approached the side of the Warthog and saluted, "Staff Sergeant Danielle O'Reilly reporting, sir."

"At ease. Where'd you come from, O'Reilly?" Logan asked. He turned on the COM on the inside of the Warthog to E-band.

"22nd Hell-Hawks. We got wiped out at Narcissus V, mate."

"How'd you survive?" Logan asked, uninterested. He'd already heard enough lone survivor stories to form their own battalion. But he knew the truth, for every lone survivor, there were 10 divisions with none.

"Got lucky, mate. Was about the _Hopeful_ when th' rest' us were sent to the Covies. Guess someone's watchin' out for 'is mate."

Logan laughed unsympathetically. He didn't believe in God. At least, not a God that would let this happen. Of course, there had to be something more. Who knows? Maybe the Covenant's religion was the right one. It wouldn't be the first time he thought about switching sides.

He looked over at O'Reilly. She was surprisingly tall for being a femme. She had dark blonde hair and a straight stature. Straighter than most male Marines. Her face didn't tell him much; there was a single cut under her left eye. Other than that, she looked like any other Marine.

The LT was about to say something when the COM crackled to life, "Lieutenant Fenner, red alert! All ships, enable Cole Protocol and prepare to engage the Covenant fleet!"

Logan turned and looked at Jason. They all knew this moment would come, but it was no less of a surprise, nor an adrenaline rush.

"Reilly!" Logan shouted, hearing Jason rev up the engine to the LRV, "Get the gun!" He watched her run to the back of the Warthog and put her oblong helmet on. She grabbed a hold of the AA cannon and took aim to the purple sky.

"Go!" Logan shouted.

The ammo counter on his MA5B read full.

* * *

Overhead, the UNSC _Goliath_ floated in the null gravity behind an invisible fence of nuclear mines between his battle group and a dozen Covenant warships.

1-to-1 odds. Not what Vice Admiral Sciuto wanted; the official ONI statistics for a ship-to-ship victory was 3 UNSC vessels to a single Covenant vessel. But this time, his ships were ready for everything.

On his view screen, they saw the Covenant cruisers stop dead from where they reentered normal space. Instead of immediately charging into the carnage like the Covenant usually did, they stopped and watched. As if they expected the humans to make the first move.

Something wasn't right. The Covenant was always predictable. Either that or a Covenant scanner had picked _something _up.

"Ensign Cour'd, have all vessels fire their MAC rounds while the Covenant isn't moving."

"_All_, sir?" the Frenchman asked.

"Yes! All!"

From the twelve UNSC cigar-shaped vessels came flashes of white light as the enormous slugs sped towards the Covenant battleships like a bullet would in a ground battle. Three shots were clean misses. Two grazed the alien shields and caused them to shimmer dull silver. The other seven found their targets.

Admiral Sciuto watched as the lead vessel's shields shimmered, and collapsed. The purple vessel, which looked more sea creature than spacecraft, loomed forward, the horizontal lines across its side heated up as the lasers beneath charged to a fine-point deadly weapon.

It moved deeper into the mine field, careful to avoid the black swirling objects that could spell disaster for the Covenant fleet.

"Perfect." Sciuto muttered to himself.

"Mr. Leonov, fire our FENRIS warhead. _Into _the mine field."

"Aye, sir." The Russian said.

The missile left the _Goliath _and sped toward the oncoming Covenant battle group.

A Covenant destroyer turned sideways, its pulse laser flared a bright red. It streaked towards the carrier _Pearl Harbor_, igniting its outer hull on fire and emptying its valuable supply of oxygen into the cold vacuum.

Two more Covenant pulse lasers flashed through the dark. The UNSC vessels took their evasive maneuvers. The _Frederick II _and _Pyric _fired their archer missiles to the closest Covenant cruisers whose shields were still recharging.

"Sir!" a bridge officer shouted, "Two Covenant vessels are heading into Zheng He. Toward Installation NZ-01!"

Sciuto was about to order a pursuit of the Covenant vessel but was distracted when the FENRIS warhead created a miniature sun in space setting off the remaining nuclear mines.

The screen dimmed to show the crew of the _Goliath _the eleven nuclear mini-stars before them.

After a minute, the stars ran out of nuclear fuel and winked out. There was no time to reminisce in their victory, out of the light, three Covenant ships emerged. Good odds, but the UNSC fleet was running out of ideas.

Along with the ships came a single blast of Covenant plasma. There was no way of telling if it was a last attempt to down a human vessel by a destroyed Covenant ship or was a shot from a survivor. Either way, running was not an option.

"Abandon ship! Turn us 90 degrees to port!" Sciuto ordered.

"Sir!" Ensign Cour'd patched a COM transmission from Captain Davinci on board the destroyer _Potomac_. The destroyer accelerated in front of the battle group and turned, presenting its starboard side to the plasma shot, "I'll take this one, Admiral." The screen winked out.

Dozens of escape pods jettisoned from the _Potomac _moments before the superheated glob of plasma washed over the destroyer and boiled its Titanium-A hull down to the skeletal frame. Moments later, that was gone too.

Vice Admiral Sciuto stood and saluted the _Potomac_. When he sat back down, he watched the empty space: all that was left were seven frames of Covenant ships. Their minefield had worked, but now something was wrong.

The three remaining Covenant vessels stood motionless against the backdrop of a billion untwinkling stars. This wasn't right.

ONI's official statistics said that 2/3 of them should be dead. But ten UNSC vessels were still running. And the Covenant vessels didn't charge their lasers or preheat their plasma turrets.

Something was horribly, horribly wrong.

"Sir?" Ensign Cour'd asked.

"Order all vessels to cease fire."

"What does this mean, sir?" Leonov asked.

"Something's wrong." Cour'd answered, "Something's changed."

"The rules." Sciuto murmured, "The rules have changed."

* * *

The Covenant cruiser zoomed through the atmosphere of Zheng He and stopped with its hangar bay over a landing platform at Installation NZ-01. It opened the bay and released a purple gravity beam.

Moments later, Covenant soldiers floated silently to the platform.

"Open fire." Lieutenant Commander Fenner ordered his five Scorpion MBTs. The pair of Hunters waiting at the bottom of the grav beam raised their shields at the human tanks.

One of the Scorpions blasted its cannon at a Hunter's shield. The slug of metal ripped through the alien's slab and through its armor, spilling orange blood and eels that comprised a symbiotic colony of the enormously fierce warriors all over the platform.

After the Hunter was dead, another MBT fired at the second. Before the slug destroyed it, the monster raised its plasma cannon and fired at a Scoprion. The blast charred the outer hull and melted some of it away, but otherwise did little to stop the human defense.

The Scorpion fired again at the Hunter. The slug ripped through the alien colony of eels and rendered the alien inert.

What appeared to be a useless alien assault was only the topmost crystal of ice on the ice berg. Next came the swarms of Grunts which set up the mortars and Shade turrets. The assault continued.

Next came the Jackals.

And then the Elites.

And finally the mortar tanks.

Then the Hunters returned.

Six micro-suns blasted from the Covenant army and obliterated the Scorpions.

Then the other Covenant cruiser let out its grav beam.

_Then_, all hell broke loose.

* * *

"It's hell down there." Derek said, looking through his oracle scope out into the city. Clearly, they hadn't been anticipating such an attack. Maybe hundreds, but not _thousands_. "We should go down there."

"No." Ryan said, "We have our orders." He added with hesitation, "They have theirs." He knew that a Spartan's purpose was to fight and eventually die fighting. The hardest things a Spartan could do was wait for a fight to come to them. Ryan remembered when John, the hand picked leader of the Spartans, chose a team of five (which would eventually become the infamous Blue Team) to infiltrate a rebel stronghold and capture the enemy leader. All the other Spartans were forced to stand back and twiddle their thumbs. That included what now made up Ryan's Gray Team.

"Ryan," Rei said, "They're getting massacred down there. We have to fight." She put a hand on his armored shoulder and nudged it slightly toward the battle outside.

Ryan tore his shoulder away. He didn't need this. Of all the Spartans, Rei had the most outspoken emotions. To any normal human being, she acted like any other Spartan; but her reactions and outspokenness would be a horrific breach of protocol had a Spartan ever been granted an officer's rank.

"Doctor." Ryan turned to Dr. Ness still frantically going on with her AI and searching for the stellar coordinates of a so-called 'reference point,' "We're getting stretched for time."

"I know, I know." Dr. Ness responded quickly. She brushed a lock of red hair out of her face, "Senior Chief 109, I can't decode random lines lickity split. I just need to ask you to… wait."

Ryan mentally sighed. He knew he couldn't rush a scientist, but he wished he could. It was only a matter of time before the Covenant blasted into their little sanctuary. They needed to get out of here, or at least send a message back to FLEETCOM.

A pair of thunder claps from Derek's sniper rifle drew Ryan's attention to the alcove that narrowed to the door into their sanctuary, "Chief!" Derek called, "Contacts coming this way. Jackals!"

Covenant scouts. Once the Covies confirmed that their prize was here, they would send their entire army. A force like that could number in the thousands. Impossible for a single battalion of Marines.

Not for Spartans.

RJ ran up next to Derek, her assault rifle shouldered. A pair of Jackals held their shield generators up against the Spartan's fire. Derek fired his rifle once. The tracer zoomed over the top of the shield. The Jackal leaned out from behind the shield and fired his plasma pistol at Derek.

Derek let the plasma wash over his shields just to get the crack at its head. The alien fell to the ground, blue blood washed over the ramp leading up to their position. The other Jackal leaned out and tried to get a single charged blast out, but RJ riddled the alien with 12.5 mm pieces of lead.

She ran up to the Jackal's former positions and policed their weapons. After dismissing them as "useless pieces of crap," Derek shouted at her to grab the shields and get back.

RJ looked back. A squad of Elites surrounded by Grunts trekked up the ramp armed with plasma rifles, needlers, and energy swords toward RJ. Grunts squealed, firing plasma rifles in her general direction, all but missing her.

An Elite charged toward RJ. She grabbed an energy shield and held it up in front of her. The shield absorbed the plasma. Needles bounced off and exploded harmlessly into the air.

The Elite raised his energy blade and grabbed the edge of the shield. It tore the protection away from the Spartan, only to be greeted by a shell in the face from a shotgun. RJ stored her assault and shot weapons, grabbed the second shield and ran back to the sanctuary under the protection of Derek's scope.

Rei now stood next to Derek, MA5B in hand. RJ handed Derek a shield generator which he strapped to his arm with earnest. The other she kept.

"No early Christmas for me?" Rei said. RJ handed her half a dozen plasma grenades, "Much obliged." Rei responded.

Ryan opened a private COM channel to Nick, "Nick, I want you to be within ten feet of Dr. Ness at all times. Unless there's an imminent threat."

"Like four dead Spartans and a squad of split-lips?" Nick asked, jogging up to Dr. Ness.

"Yeah," Ryan answered, "That would be threatening." He switched back to the normal G-band for his Spartans and ran up to the alcove.

At the top of the ramp, Derek and RJ had their positions behind Jackal shield generators. Rei was inside the doorway feeding them ammo or explosives when need be. She occasionally jumped out and fired her assault rifle at an opening in the Covenant line.

Ryan could see that the front line mainly consisted of Jackals behind stationary shields who would get blown to pieces by a Spartan's grenade only to be replaced by another Covenant warrior.

"Rei." Ryan said, "Christmastime for the Covies. Breakout a LOTUS mine."

"You got it!" Rei said hungrily. She opened her duffel bag, tossed RJ a plasma grenade, and then pulled out the anti-tank mine as if it were made of thin glass. She looked up at Ryan and said, "Boom."

"Time it up. Fifteen seconds." Ryan ordered.

Rei followed through, attaching a detonator for fifteen seconds from now, "Done." She said.

Ryan snatched the explosive from her hands, it was about as big as the Spartan's forearm. He stepped outside and hurled the disk like an Olympic discus behind the Covenant line.

It impacted the ramp's base with three seconds left. The mangled Grunt body underneath made the Covenant believe that _that _was the attack. Ryan would never know, otherwise he would've laughed when a Jackal said, with two seconds left: "Stupid humans, reduced to throwing stones."

One second left.

* * *

Amanda felt like she was going insane. There was no telling when the Covenant would blast through her walls and gut them all.

She took off her lab coat, it was getting too hot in here, "Jennifer, scan the entire room again. There has to be something we missed."

"Doctor, there's nothing. The reference point is completely absent from the room. Probably afraid that their enemies would take it and attack their homework-"

"Then search the database. Search the other rooms. Search anything!"

Jennifer rolled her eyes on the holographic display. Had this been any other place and any other time, Amanda would have commented on her adolescence, but knew that as long as Jennifer tapped her foot or gave some sign that she was "listening to music" then she was working.

"God," she whispered, "Just ten more minutes. I'll be happy with five. _Please_."

Amanda had been agnostic all her life. But it had come to this to get her to pray. She'd had liked to say more, or ask further questions but she would have to wait till later.

If there was a "later."

"Doctor." Jennifer said, "I found a case, er, folder, labeled 'Secrets.' Twenty to one it's in there."

"What are you waiting for?" Amanda asked. She dropped the codes she was working on and looked at Jennifer's holographic simulated eyes.

"It's locked. I've been trying to open it for the past five minutes. It _is _the last idea we have though." The Artificial Intelligence said.

Anger boiled inside Amanda. She slammed her fists down on the alien computer in a violence that she'd never exerted before. Had she something to throw, it would have been shattered by now.

A dead end. Just another dead end. She was trapped in here. Inside this accursed box.

The box…

Dr. Halsey once told her, "You can't disprove logic with more logic. You must think outside of the box."

Of course, going outside was suicide now, so she tried the next best thing: Amanda looked at the walls of the sanctuary. The runes seemed to form perfect lines at the wall behind her, like a sheet of writing on notebook paper. She followed the runes around to the left, Soon the writing seemed to go vertically. A group of runes danced around each other eventually forming a simple shape complicated by the thousands of smaller versions that avoided each other in a complicated ballet forming a single rune.

"That's it." She murmured.

You can't see that is spells 'physics' if you only watch the letter 'p.' Sometimes you have to look at the big picture.

Amanda ran back to the terminal where Jennifer had put on a pair of head phones and "sat down" on the terminal, "Jennifer." Amanda half-yelled. The AI gave the impression of confusion, "Is there a rune that looks like this?" She drew a crude drawing with her finger in the air: three lines stemming from a single line grown off a circle.

Jennifer copied the motions and displayed a more professional version on the holographic console, "Um…" she said, "Yes. It means 'Knight'."

"Use it as the password." Amanda ordered.

Three seconds passed, "I'm in!" Jennifer announced excitedly.

"Do you have the coordinates?"

"Yes. Processing now. Saved."

"Excellent." Amanda exhaled.

She turned around, four of the five Spartans were engaged in a pitched battle with a dozen Covenant warriors. This was her first look at the aliens. There were a few goofy ones that only came up to the Spartan's waist. Their heads were located in the center of their bulky triangular body. The Spartans seemed to regard them only as a nuisance from the way they moved in relation to each other.

Another of the aliens, as tall as the Spartans (8 feet, Amanda estimated) seemed to be leading the others. They were bipedals, their heads were oblong and pointed out in front of them. The aliens wore different colors of armor, most likely to distinguish rank.

Amanda watched as a giant alien's mouth opened into four separate mandibles and yelled something in its language.

The smaller, impish aliens chortled in their high-pitched voices and pointed their bulby, purple weapons toward her. Nick dug his heels into the ground and drew a small object shaped like a handle to something. When the Spartan pulled the trigger on the handle, a blade flashed into existence on both ends forming a two-pronged sword.

He held the sword back, ready to strike like a viper. The Grunts ran toward him as single mass, firing nano-suns in their direction. The Spartan let the plasma wash over his armor, the MJOLNIR's shielding flared as it absorbed the super-heated metal.

Nick lunged forward, slashing and slicing the aliens into pieces. Amanda saw that the severed limbs were burnt at the ends. _Electrically-limited plasma field_, her scientific mind was still working.

Gunfire blared. Ryan and Rei mowed down the dozens of Grunts that swarmed into the room. Rei pulled out a grenade, "No!" Ryan shouted. Rei looked at him, holding her rifle in one hand, the grenade in the other.

"Sorry." She said. Rei pulled the pin and tossed the explosive into the mass of alien bodies. She lunged the weight of her MJOLNIR armor and herself from the coming blast. Ryan stepped back and dropped to his knees keeping a continuous stream of fire.

The grenade exploded, sending aliens and alien parts everywhere.

A gigantic alien flung itself from the blast, dropped its plasma rifle, and looked up. It saw the only standing Spartan and narrowed its already small eyes. Nick sprinted to the alien, energy sword out and ready.

The Elite jumped up and hurtled a small blue orb towards Nick. The Spartan feinted to the left, the alien grenade hurled past Nick's head and stuck to the side of the ancient computer.

Amanda watched the grenade. It made a hissing noise and flashed signaling it would go off. The grenade had attached to the side of the computer next to Jennifer's hard drive. It was her real "body."

She used all her strength and pulled the metal stub out of the computer. Instead of melting into the console, Jennifer's holographic self winked from existence.

"Doctor!" Nick sprinted with god-like speed and pushed Amanda away from the bomb with the force of a train.

Amanda landed fifty feet away on all fours. She rolled over just in time to hear the blast and see the explosion of plasma and an outline of MJOLNIR armor.

To Be Continued…


End file.
